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Willie Brown Thinks DA Chesa Boudin Should Run Again. And Says He’d Win

By Josh Koehn: sfstandard – excerpt (includes video)

San Francisco’s political oddsmakers began taking figurative bets Tuesday on who would become the city’s next district attorney as the Board of Supervisors certified the recent election results and the clock started on Mayor London Breed’s window to appoint a successor to Chesa Boudin…

But at least one of the mayor’s advisors and predecessors in office thinks Boudin—who told the Chronicle he might run again in November or next year—would have an excellent chance to win his job back.

“I think Chesa runs in November,” former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown told The Standard. “Of course, why wouldn’t he? … He got 45% of the (recall) vote. I would run if I’m Chesa. I know that was not a true measurement of my electability in this recall. ‘I was literally running against myself.’ Nobody else on the ballot, period.”…

“They have knocked off the school board, they have knocked off the DA’s office, there is now only one major (office) left,” Brown said. “And they won’t go after (Breed) now, on a recall, but in 18 months she’s on the ballot for re-election. So, we’ve really got our work cut out for us.”…(more)

deregulated housing bills, Housing

The State’s RHNA Housing Quota days are numbered

By Bob Silvestri : marinpost – excerpt

The State’s unrealistic, dysfunctional housing regulations demand that cities and counties “build” more housing, even though 98% of California’s cities and counties don’t build any housing: never have/never will. But, for all the anti-NIMBY, gavel pounding, and stomping of feet the state’s “trickle-down-the market will solve everything” approach has been an utter failure.

Let me repeat that. The state’s approach to increasing affordable housing has been an utter failure.

New ideas have been suggested but the state continues to double down on failure. A day of reckoning is approaching.

Over the past 15 years that the state has added regulations on top of regulations, penalties on top of penalties, and even resorted to having a special task force suing municipalities for Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) compliance, California housing production today (about 1 new house for every 656 people with a population of 39.4 million) is worse, on a per capita basis, than it was when all this started with the passage of SB 375 in 2008 (about 1 new home built for every 610 people in 2008 with a population of 36.3 million). And it’s a lot less than we were building 40 years ago (about 1 new home per 265 people with a population 23.8 million).

In other words, we’re building less housing today than 40 years ago…(more)

Housing

Auditor cheers critics of edicts to add housing

By Richard Halstead : marinij – excerpt

Marin critics of housing mandates handed down by the state say a new report by Cali- fornia’s auditor validates their objections.

“I applaud the audit,” said Mill Valley resident Susan Kirsch, founder of Catalysts for Local Control. “It is one of the greatest contributions we’ve had to try to get accurate numbers that jurisdictions can rely on.”

The auditor’s report, re- leased last month, supports analysis by the Palo Alto-based Embarcadero Institute that the state mandates are based on inflated estimates of future housing needs, Kirsch said.

“Overall, our audit determined that the Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) does not en- sure that its needs assessments are accurate and adequately supported,” wrote Michael Tilden, acting California state au- ditor, in a letter to the governor and the Legislature accompanying the report.

“I firmly believe that the auditor’s report raises enough questions that the state Legislature should look into this and possibly consider eliminating the penalties for not achieving the Regional Housing Needs Assessment mandates, especially if we might need to go back and redo them,” said Novato Council- woman Pat Eklund, a member of the California Alliance of Local Electeds, which pushed for the audit… (attached)

Comments via email:

First of all the RHNA numbers have been proven wrong after a recent state audit. What are we doing about this?

second: we all know that the problem is affordable housing not just housing.
third: Look at who benefits from the building of the housing…. developers etc. Who is buying the properties to turn around and create rentals?
fourth: local control continues to be eroded. What are we the people doing about it ?
Housing

‘Housing First’ policy needs an adjustment

Guest Commentary : calmatters – excerpt

In summary: A Sacramento homeless shelter for mothers and their children is ineligible for millions of dollars in state homeless funds because it requires its residents to stay clean and sober. Assembly Bill 2623 could change that…

California’s “Housing First” mandate, adopted in 2016, provides that “the use of alcohol or drugs in and of itself … is not a reason for eviction” from state-supported homeless shelters. I support that policy. Many of the people sleeping on our sidewalks, under freeways or on park benches are addicts. They need secure housing before they can begin to address their addiction.

Assembly Bill 2623, authored by Assembly Member Carlos Villapudua, offers a narrow but sensible exception to the state’s overly rigid Housing First policy. It would allow a housing provider to prohibit the use of alcohol or drugs in facilities where children are present and the tenant is under a court order to refrain from the use of alcohol or drugs as a condition of reunification with their child.

Incredibly and unfortunately, the Assembly Housing Committee is refusing to allow the bill even to be heard — they want to silence this problem...(more)

Housing

California State Auditor releases scathing report on RHNA process

The California Alliance of Local Electeds (CALE) has just released the following, supporting the findings of the Office of the California State Auditor. The State Auditor says the state’s “housing goals are not supported by evidence.”

Local community organizations throughout the state have been doing independent studies and arguing this for almost a decade…(more)

Housing

State demands SF figure out how to fund enough affordable housing

If their plan is inadequate, the city could lose local control and funds
If you think approving a project in San Francisco is difficult, try approving a plan encompassing 82,000 units. That’s how much the state is mandating San Francisco to build within eight years, and city planners are attempting to meet the 2031 goal while balancing the interests of marginalized communities. One major problem looms: Money.

“The resources aren’t there to get to what we are being asked to do by the state,” said Planning Director Rich Hillis at a Planning Commission meeting Thursday.

That’s a problem. Thanks to new laws, localities that fail to submit plans that meet the state’s requirements could lose local control on projects and affordable housing funding…(more)

Even the SF Planning Commissioners are feeling pinched now. Too much demand on cities to grow beyond our capacity.
Too many questions remain unanswered and we are getting tired of the constant stress and pressures. Are we to understand that not only is the city required to entitle thousands of new units of housing (This somewhat depends on property owners bringing projects to be entitled) but, cities must now pay to build the housing, or sell bonds to pay? Does this mean that to live in this state we must agree to rising taxes, housing costs, gas prices, food and utility prices? When do the voters revolt and what does that look like?
Housing

Lawsuits filed to protect single family homes from Constitutional Overreach

Join Our Neighborhood Voices to help us fight the bad bills and

Four Southern California cities filed a Lawsuit to overturn SB9 and protect the single family homes that most American families want to live in from being phased out of California by urban density zealots.

Read all about it. https://www.livablecalifornia.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/SB9-03.29.2022-RB-Lawsuit-re-SB-9.pdf
In enacting Senate Bill 9 (“SB 9”) in 2021, the State of California eviscerated a city’s local control over land use decisions and a community-tailored zoning process.

AIDS Healthcare Foundation Files Lawsuit Against Controversial Housing Bill: https://kfiam640.iheart.com/content/2021-09-23-aids-healthcare-foundation-files-lawsuit-against-controversial-housing-bill/